The Way We Are
by KokoAmethyst
Summary: It's a normal morning, consisting of Amethyst and Pearl's usual fighting. But, when Pearl brings up painful memories from the past, it pushes Amethyst to her breaking point, and the turnout is heartbreaking...


**Author's Note: Now before you say anything, yes I know that I have another story to tend to, but I really needed to put this down. At first I was just gonna write down a little note so I could come back to this later, but I got glued to this story. I apologize that I get side tracked with stuff and I'll try to keep better story commitment in the future. This is taking place during the events of my other story** " _ **She Loves Me"**_ **(which will be posted later). This is also a one shot but it's about Pearl and Amethyst. Just to make this clear, THERE IS NO SMUT IN THIS STORY, just adorable fluffiness from my favorite couple (eventually). Hope you enjoy!~Amethyst**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters from Steven Universe or some of the settings. The only thing I own is the setting in the end.**

* * *

The Temple door that lead to Amethyst's room opens as the groggy gem appears, dragging her feet behind and yawning.

"Good Morning, Amethyst!" says the young hybrid as he walks to the stools and sits down abruptly, still a tad sleepy himself.

Pearl instantly places a plate in front of him that's full of perfectly cooked, along with healthy, food.

Just then, the phone rings. Pearl walks casually over and answers the person on the other end.

"Hello?"

"Uh, hi. May I talk to Steven please?" questions a familiar voice.

"Oh of course, Connie!" Pearl says cheerfully, eyeing Steven before she hands him the device.

"Hey Connie!" Steven says, now fully awake.

"Hey! My violin lesson was canceled for today, so I was wondering if you wanted to hang out?"

Steven then looks to Pearl, opening his mouth to ask her when Garnet chimes in.

"Yes, you can hang out with Connie today."

Steven's eye's light up with excitement as he tells Connie the great news, while practically jumping off of the stool to get dressed.

All the while, Amethyst had been staring at his plate, slowly sneaking up to it, to steal some during his distraction. The second he got up, she pounced his stool and was about to inhale all of it until-

" _Amethyst!_ " scolds Pearl, "You know that's Steven's food. If you want some, get your own plate."

"Ugh...whatever" the short gem mutters, while rolling her eyes, starts to get up.

"Well, I'm off to meet Connie! See you guys later!" Steven says, and with a wave of his hand, he was out the door.

Amethyst by now has her plate, with stacks of food on top, and sits down at the counter. She stares at her food for a second before shoveling handfuls of it into her mouth, meanwhile getting food everywhere.

"Amethyst will you slow down? You're getting it all over the place and creating a horrible mess!"

Amethyst stops, mid chew, and slowly turns her head to look at Pearl, wearing a nasty glare. Then, a wicked grin makes it's way onto her face as an idea pops into her head. Suddenly, there's a bright light as she transforms into dogcopter.

Garnet, not wanting to see how it turns out, walks over to the door leading to the Temple, opens her's, and exits silently.

Amethyst flies on her side in order to blow food right onto Pearl and everything around her. This goes on for about a minute until Amethyst starts to get bored with it and turns back into her original form. Forgetting that she was still above the food, Amethyst falls on top of it splashing Pearl with what is now mush, one last time.

" _AMETHYST!"_ Pearl screeches, now returning the glare she received earlier. "CLEAN UP THIS DISASTER RIGHT NOW!"

"MAKE ME!" Amethyst shouts back, the glare returning to her face. "YOU KNOW, THIS WOULDN'T BE SUCH A PROBLEM IF YOU WEREN'T SUCH A CLEAN FREAK!"

"IT WOULDN'T BE HERE IF YOU WEREN'T SUCH AN IGNORANT SLOB!"

"I'D RATHER BE A SLOB THAN AN UPTIGHT PRISS, LITTLE MISS PERFECT!"

"AT LEAST I'M NOT SOME MISTAKE FROM A KINDERGARTEN" Pearl shrieks, instantly regretting what she said.

"A-Amethyst I-"

"SAVE IT! YOU WOULDN'T HAVE SAID IT IF IT WASN'T WHAT YOU TRULY THOUGHT ABOUT ME!" and with that, she spins on her heals and darts to the warp pad.

"Ameth-" she's then cut off by the sound of the warp going off. Feeling guilty, Pearl slowly walked to her room, ashamed of her actions.

~..xXx..~

Amethyst had warped to the Galaxy Warp, she knew that all of them were still down, so she brought a jar of goop from Peridot's robots that she always kept in her gem.

"Where do these even go? Probably far away from _Pearl_." she mumbles to herself angrily, as tears begin to fall down her face.

She starts off to the one on the right. Amethyst summons the jar, yanks out the cork, and pours it over the cracks. It then starts to glow as it begins to mend back together.

Once it was finished, she stepped onto it as curiosity began to bubble up inside her about where it might possibly lead.

"Well, I got nothin' else to do…" she says softly.

But before she warps away, she summons her whip and wraps it around a piece of a fallen pillar, then pulls it down and warps away, crushing the warp pad after she vanishes.

The warp pad takes her to an old, gem built, structure that looked similar to an ancient greek design. The building itself was standing slightly to the right and had a dark gray color to it. The only way to enter was the dirt bridge that connected to the doorway, but didn't look very stable. The air was eerily quiet except for the occasional rubble that fell off the sides.

Although the building was screaming "Danger", she continued to enter, dismissing the possibility of being poofed. The only thing she wanted was to be alone, but the thought of being poofed didn't sound so bad rig tears reminded her of Pearl, salty. The word described her fellow team member perfectly.

Finally, she reaches what appears to be the roof of the ancient structure. Where there used to be marble railing, now stood lone posts, slowly crumbling into nothing. There were huge chunks of the flat roof missing as well, leaving big gaps that took up most of the space. Far on the other side was some of the marble flooring that had yet to disintegrate. It looked unstable, actually far from safe to stand on.

Amethyst begins to navigate the path to it with blurry vision, slipping every now and then. She finally reaches the area and walks over to look below, while leaning against the railing that, amazingly, was still there. It looked as if this was preserved just for Amethyst, expecting her to come, to be her shoulder to cry one.

~..xXx..~

Pearl was curled up on her side on one of the taller water pillars, while practical rivers were flowing from her eyes, hitting the floor and melting into the liquid base.

" _How could I say that to my own teammate?"_ she thinks guiltily to herself. " _She didn't deserve that...I want to apologize but it's not like she would ever listen to me…"_

"You will find her at the abandoned Temple." Came a calm, stoic voice from the short body of a blue gem.

"S-S-Sapphire?!" sniffles a shocked, yet confused Pearl. "Why aren't you and Ruby fused?!"

"Ruby is upset about how you treated Amethyst." Sapphire states, showing no trace of how she feels about the situation.

"I used my future vision while we were still fused." she says plainly, answering Pearl's unspoken question. "I knew this wasn't going to end well."

Pearl, now wanting to talk to Sapphire properly, changes her position from curled on the floor to sitting on her knees, dries her tears.

"I'm sorry Sapphire, I didn't mean for that to slip out. I didn't want any of this to happen, but it did, now more than half of the team probably hates me. Oh no, how will Steven react if he were to ever find out how I treated her?!"

By now a new set of hot tears were spilling down her face from the guilt and pain of it all. Sapphire silently glides over to Pearl and sits on her knees as well to look her in the eyes.

"Apologizing to me will be no help, you need to go to Amethyst and fix the pain you have caused her. Also, you should bring some of Peridot's goop from her robots, you are going to need it to reach her"

With that, Sapphire stands up and leaves the broken Gems' room without making a sound.

~..xXx..~

Ruby's angrily pacing the stone floor of the Burning Room, leaving scorched footprints in her tracks.

"How dare she say that to Amethyst!" she mumbles through gritted teeth. "She didn't deserve that! She didn't deserve anything so hurtful!"

"Pearl is going to talk to Amethyst." Sapphire speaks as she glides over to her partner.

"Do you really think talking is going to fix this?!" questions Ruby as she stops to look at Sapphire.

"Ruby, you know that violence is never the answer to these kinds of situations."

"Well it's about to be!"

"You need to calm down."

"She's my best friend, Sapphire, I'm not gonna calm down! How does this not bother you?!"

"Everything is going to work out in the end, I have already looked. There is nothing to worry about. I was angry at first, but I have forgiven her and I suggest you should as well."

"If you honestly think that I'm gonna forgive her anytime soon, you're wrong!"

Sapphire floats over to Ruby and places a cool hand on her firey hot shoulder

"I am completely okay with that. Just please consider it."

Ruby turns and gazes into Sapphire's eye, her anger begins to melt away along with her high temperature, and her jaw unclenches.

"I'm sorry...you know how I get when I'm ticked off, there's just no stopping me."

"It's alright Ruby." She says before placing a kiss on Ruby's now cooler cheek.

Ruby stares dreamily at Sapphire, then starts to lean toward her and as they lock lips, a bright light flashes leaving Garnet in it's wake.

~..xXx..~

Amethyst was sitting on the cold marble platform, with her knees drawn up to her chest, still sobbing. It felt as if each teardrop that slid down her round face, a piece of her heart fell with it.

The pain from her past had always left a scar on her illusionary heart, that could never fully heal. But hearing Pearl utter those haunting words, brought the horrible memories back to the surface, feeling her heart be torn to ribbons once again.

" _If I'm such a mistake, then why do I even bother trying to stay on the team?"_ Amethyst thought to herself.

" _I'm obviously not wanted or needed, so I might as well just leave and never return. But no matter where I go, those stupid warp pads can find me. If I were to crack my gem, Steven's spit would heal me. Wait, what if I were to_ _ **shatter**_ _my gem? Then would he be able to fix it? Hehe probably not."_

" _So that's my plan then: shatter my gem beyond repair and I won't be anyone's burden anymore…"_

Amethyst started going back over the final details of her plan, but was too distracted to hear the warp pad below go off as the Gem that caused her such agony, appear.

~..xXx..~

Pearl was stepping off of the sleek warp pad when she heard the sobs from above. She turned her head in the direction it was coming from, piecing together that Amethyst was on the roof. Pearl began sprinting toward the doorway of the large tower, not even noticing the extreme damage to the building that would usually make her uneasy and self conscious.

~..xXx..~

Meanwhile with Amethyst, she had summoned her whip and was repeatedly smashing the butt of the handle into her gem, causing cracks to spiderweb out from impact. This was step two of her plan, to crack her gem enough that when it was smashed it would be completely obliterated to the point of nothing. Step two was almost complete, just a couple more bashes and she would be set. Step three would come soon enough.

~..xXx..~

Pearl was practically flying up the staircase that seemed to never end. Her thoughts rushing through her mind and mixing together, making them one big mess. She tried to quickly think of what she would say to Amethyst when she approached her, knowing that "I'm sorry" had to be fit in somewhere.

While being distracted by her thoughts, Pearl almost fell into a giant gap that took up her entire path, but she quickly stopped dead in her tracks. She was trying to figure out how to get around the large missing chunk when a loud scraping sound could be heard echoing down, causing her freak out even more than before. But when Pearl glanced up to figure out what it was, she realized that there was still a reasonable distance away from her and her destination.

"Screw it." Pearl mumbled to herself.

She power jumped over the gap and through the empty patches along the wide staircase. After a second or so, she finally reached the roof, and was startled by the sight she was welcomed by.

The first thing Pearl's eyes caught was the sight of Amethyst about to get crushed with a hunk of the roof, wrapped by her whip, that was coming straight for her as if on purpose. Amethyst was staring at it with an air of determination, acceptance, and sorrow. There were tears still flowing down her face that glistened as light reflected off of them.

" _AMETHYST!"_ Pearl cried while launching herself toward the shorter gem.

Amethyst heard instantly recognized the voice and turned her head to look toward Pearl with eyes filled with shock.

Pearl got there just in time to tackle Amethyst and to try to get her out of the way of the large piece of marble. But, her plan failed quickly as she managed to push Amethyst flat to the ground, still underneath the speeding chunk that would surely decimate her gem, and then rolled past her now laying down body, away from the danger that she was trying to protect the other from.

Pearl could only watch helplessly from the sidelines as Amethyst was crushed by it. A huge gust of wind erupted from the massive object hitting the ground, blowing dust and tiny chunks of marble everywhere.

After the air settled, Pearl raced over, transformed herself into Sugilite, and lifted the piece off of Amethyst. She then chucked it over the edge, formed back into herself, and fell onto her knees as she picked up the remains of Amethyst's gem, liquid beginning to form in the corners of her eyes.

~..xXx..~

For half an hour straight, Pearl was curled on her side, as tears were freely flowing down her face while she cradled what was still left of Amethyst.

" _I'm so sorry, Amethyst...if I knew this would happen I wouldn't have said anything..."_ Pearl managed to choke out.

Pearl slowly got up to sit on her knees, staring down at the shattered pieces in her hand, her eyes began stinging and once again, her vision grew blurry.

" _What am I gonna do? Amethyst's gem is far too gone to heal."_ Pearl mumbled to herself.

" _I would ask Steven to use his powers, but if he were to find out that I was the cause of this, he'd despise me, breaking our trust forever."_

Pearl was at a loss, she couldn't figure out how to heal Amethyst without being caught or it not even working. She had gather as many pieces of the gem that she could find, but it still wasn't enough. It looked as if someone had taken a bite out of the right side of her gem, leaving the edge jagged and sharp.

Out of options, Pearl used her gem as a light making sure that she picked up as much of the pieces as physically possible, then bubbling her gem shards, but instead of sending them to the Temple's burning room, she kept it to safely carry them.

Holding onto the pastel bubble for dear life, she began to descend the everlasting spiral staircase, making sure she was extremely careful around the edges of holes. Pearl was delicately tiptoeing around anything hazardous to the bubble, pushing her well being aside.

The last thing Pearl wanted was to either drop the bubble or be poofed due to clumsiness. Although, she was the last gem to ever poof themselves being clumsy, but right now isn't the time for arrogance.

At last, Pearl arrived to the base of the crumbling structure and sprinted out off the doorway to the warp pad. She quickly warped to the Galaxy Warp and then from there, to Roses Fountain. Pearl darted to the fountain and opened the crystalline bubble, dropping the purple stone onto her slender hand.

She then took the gem and shoved it into the rosey water, breaking the perfectly still surface. Pearl staring at Amethyst's gem with anticipation, but after a minute went by, nothing happened. Suddenly, it began to shine blindingly bright, and started to slowly repair the chunk missing.

After ten minutes of waiting, Pearl bubbled the gemstone once again, but made sure that the bubble was filled with the healing liquid. She continued to stare at the gem and realized how agonizingly long the healing process would take. By the looks of it, she'd be lucky if it finished that week at the _**least**_.

With the painfully slow waiting time, Pearl had no way around this and would have to face the fellow Crystal Gems when she arrived back home. Pearl stood and inched to the warp pad with shaky legs, fearing what will await her when she returns.

~..xXx..~

She finally reached the pad and warped to the Temple, her entire body trembling and she clung onto the bubble, her knuckles turning a pale teal color, but still making sure not to pop it. Pearl knew she finally arrived even when her eyes were clamped shut. She timidly opened them and the first thing in her line of sight was Garnet.

"G-Garnet! I-I-I can explain!" Pearl stammered.

Garnet quietly held up her hand and silenced Pearls stutters.

"It doesn't matter, I know exactly what happened. I have managed to keep Ruby calm for now. But, how are you going to explain this to Steven." Garnet states while gesturing to Amethyst's gem floating in the rosy water.

"I...I don't know…" Pearl says, her tone sounding guilt stricken and defeated.

"Well you have until the end of the day to figure that out. You're on your own on this. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to talk to Ruby again." She then exits into the burning room, a bright flash seeping through the cracks of the closing door and yelling could be heard right before it shut.

Pearl, not knowing what else to do, retreats to her room as well, her brain thinking up how to explain this to Steven. She knelt onto the top of the center water pillar, caressing the bubble and watching the gem inside slowly heal. For the third time that day, tears were pouring from her eyes, the guilt building up and becoming stronger for every minute that Amethyst wasn't healed.

"Pearl?"

She tenses up by the sound of the all too familiar voice. It was the end of the line for her. He found out, Pearl's guilt levels rising, causing the pain to be unbearable. She curled in on herself, still clutching the bubble, loudly sobbing and trying to apologize but everything came out as an unintelligible mess.

"Pearl!" Steven shouted as he rushed toward her. "Pearl, what's wrong?!"

"A-Amethyst…" She managed to say, not daring to look at him as the waterfall of tears continued.

"What are you talking about? What's in that bubble?"

Pearl said nothing as she uncurled enough to show Steven the regenerating gem it withheld.

"I-is that...Amethyst?" Steven questioned, afraid to know the answer, even though he knew, deep down, it was correct.

She simply nodded, cuddling the crystalline orb once again.

"How did this happen?"

"M-M-Me..." Pearl croaked.

She tearfully explained what had happened over the past couple of hours, every once in awhile pausing to get her bearings enough to continue. All the while, Steven simply nodded and said absolutely nothing, absorbing every last word that was spoken from her pale lips. Pearl couldn't even look at him, afraid that he would grow angry and might even lash out on her. She felt the weight of his gaze the entire time, secretly wishing that her gem could join Amethyst's inside the large ball.

"Hm." was the only thing that Steven uttered at the end of her spiel. Along with a serious look playing in his eyes.

"I'm so sorry Ste-" Pearl was cut off by Steven falling to his knees and pretty much tackling her in a hug, being careful not to damage the bubble.

~..xXx..~

A week went by and Pearl had yet to put down the pure white orb, constantly watching and protecting it. Multiple times Garnet had used her future vision, curious to know when Amethyst would fully heal and how Pearl will react when she does. So far, the outcome was very surprising, well, not to her.

Amethyst would be finished by that night, but at a very ungodly hour.

"Looks like Steven will wake up to a delightful surprise then." Garnet says to herself, a smile creeping onto her face.

"What did you say?" questions Steven, as he shuts the screen door and walks up to her.

"Oh, nothing."

"Come on, I wanna know!"

"Alright. It's a surprise. That's all I'm going to tell you."

"Fine…" he grumbles.

"Trust me, you'll be glad I didn't tell you what it was." she ruffles his hair, strolls to the warp pad, and teleports out.

Right after, the Temple door opens, revealing a tall, pastel gem and a matching bubble. Pearl looked as if she hadn't slept in days, bloodshot eyes, dark circles, and wore a droopy expression.

"Uh...Pearl?"

"Hm?" she replies sleepily.

"Aren't you tired?"

"...Wha-oh no, of course not. Why do you ask?" Pearl mumbles, rubbing one of her eyes

"No reason…" He says not believing her one bit, but doesn't want to push her.

Pearl says nothing more as she grabs out a kettle, fills it with water, places it onto the stove, and leans against the counter. The room falls awkwardly silent while Pearl stares at the snowy white bubble, a hint of longing in her red eyes.

"You miss Amethyst don't you?" speaks the young boy, breaking the silence.

"What? No! I'm just waiting for our team to be completed again, that's all."

Pearl nervously utters, turning her face to hide the pale blue blush displayed on her cheeks.

"Then why are you blushing?"

" _Oh darn it, I didn't conceal it fast enough!"_ Thinks Pearl as she grows even more nervous and hesitant.

"I-I was just...uh...thinking about something is all."

"Oh, alright!"

Steven, not wanting them to fall into an awkward silence, walks over to the screen door, opens it and shouts over his shoulder that he's out to see Connie.

Pearl didn't even process what he said, she was way too deep in thought then suddenly the tea kettle began to shriek. She turned off the hot stovetop and poured herself tea before walking into her room to be alone once again.

Pearl summoned a pillow for the bubble to rest on as she sat across from it sipping her tea. The room was perfectly quiet apart from the peaceful sound of rushing water from the pillars.

The pale gem sat there for hours on end, waiting for Amethyst to fully heal. Pearl would often check the time and left the room for a couple minutes to put Steven to bed. She returned and fell back into her original position, seated in front of the cushioned orb.

* * *

 **Author's Note: I noticed that I said that this was going to have fluff in it and I apologize for there being lack of. I promised from this point on, it's going to get happier!~Amethyst**

* * *

Pearl was struggling to keep her eyes open. She was drained from all of the anxiety and nervousness that the situation brought her. It was definitely dragging her down emotionally and physically. For the past week Pearl was worried sick, thinking that she would accidentally drop the bubble or that Amethyst would never actually heal. She cared too much about her and Pearl had vowed to protect this gem ever since...that.

She woke up with a start, her neck and body aching from keeping the same position for so long. Pearl quickly remembered what she was doing in her room in the first place. She stole a glance toward the cushioned orb that still contained the deep purple rock.

"YES, SHE'S FINALLY DONE!" Pearl gasped.

Pearl grabbed the bubble and popped it within a blink of an eye. She placed the now whole gem back onto the feather pillow and watched with anticipation.

Amethyst's gem began to glow and steadily rose into the air, taking her new form. Her new outfit consisted of black skinny jeans with white star patches on both knees, her boots were a creamier white, and a deep gray t-shirt with holes cut out of the shoulders.

Before she knows it, Amethyst is tackled to the ground by the surprising strength of Pearl.

"Promise me that you'll never leave me again…" Pearl spoke with all seriousness but also love, tightening her already iron-like grasp on the plump gem.

"Woah P chill." Amethyst said while a deep blush formed, not even attempting to break the embrace.

" _Promise me that you'll never leave me again…"_ Pearl uttered a tad forcefully this time, tears running down her face.

There was a long moment of silence, aside from Pearl's ragged sobs.

"Of course I won't."

Rustling could be heard as Amethyst repositioned herself so she was now facing Pearl, wrapping her thick arms around her tiny waist.

"I'm always gonna be with you…"

This caused Pearl to cry even more, practically squeezing Amethyst to death,who didn't mind in one bit. Unbeknownst to them, their gems were giving off a soft glow as they lay there together, in pure bliss.

~..xXx..~

Steven was sitting on the couch with Connie as the Temple door opened.

"Good morning Pe-Opal?!" He shouted with stars glistening in his eyes.

"What are you talking about, Steven?" the Pearl half questioned.

Then she heard her own voice, but it only faintly surprised the body's occupants. It felt...good to be fused, to be one.

"Good morning you two." came a voice from behind them.

"Greetings Garnet." Opal said with a smiling face.

"I'm glad to see you both getting along." Garnet spoke with a smirk.

This caused Opal to blush, knowing exactly what she was hinting to.

"Are you gonna stay like this forever?!" Steven asked excitedly.

"Hm...that's a big decision. We should talk about that before taking such action."

Suddenly, Opal vanished, spitting out the couple who were holding hands calmly.

"Let's do it-well I-I mean if Pearl's okay with it of course…" Amethyst mumbled sheepishly.

All eyes were on Pearl, everyone dying to know what she was thinking. Pearl made eye contact with Garnet and spoke steadily.

"Can you teach us how to sustain Opal?"

* * *

 **Author's Note: Well I'm glad I finally finished this! Honestly, I was struggling a bit trying to think of Amethyst's new outfit. I decided to base it on the way I dress because that was just easiest. I gotta apologize again for this taking so long and "Broken Together" as well. I just hope it sounds as good to you as it did me. I'll try to work on "Broken Together" this weekend when I find the time. I'm gonna keep the tab open to remind myself! Read and review, please no flames!~Amethyst**


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